Reasons for the Fragmentation in the Strategy Field (PDF)

Seminar paper from the year 2003 in the subject Business economics - Business Management, Corporate Governance, grade: A+, Trinity College Dublin (BESS), course: Advanced Strategic Management, language: English, abstract: The question to examine in this essay has evolved from a statement
made by Elfring and Volberda (2001, p.1) which reads as follows: "In the
evolution of strategy research, a diversity of partly competitive and partly
supplementary paradigms have emerged." The task is now to look behind the
statement and to ask why this fragmentation happened and how we can
make sense of all these different perspectives. Firstly, it is important to
examine the roots of the strategy field in order to understand why strategy
matters at all and why academics spend so much time and effort on defining
their view of "the right" corporate strategy. Following this, I will give an
overview of the most common perspectives and schools which emerged
along the way. Finally, I will conclude with the reasons behind this
diversification and give an outlook into the future of the strategy research.
Before starting up it is essential to underline the fact that there is no
such thing as the "one and only" strategy which has developed over time but
that with practically every new decade (starting with the 1960's) there was a
new focus and a new way of seeing strategy. The field of strategy is one of
the most integrated research areas which exists and for that reason scientists
from many different academic backgrounds contributed to the mainstreams
of strategy. The point that Elfring and Volberda (2001, p.2) argue is to walk
away from inventing new directions and rather look back to pull ideas
together for creating a new academic basis to build on.